Dreams
by maryh10000
Summary: Nightmares. Roy, Vato Falman, Kain Fuery, Heymans Breda, Jean Havoc. Somewhat spoilerish for my fic "The Toll". Don't know how much farther I may go with this.
1. Human Transmutation

Author's Note:

The parts in italics are from my fic "The Toll." This takes place sometime after that fic.

* * *

He was sitting on a concrete floor. His hands were locked into some sort of metal block that kept him from bringing them together. Why should that matter? He couldn't do Alchemy anymore. It was completely dark, which was also odd, since his eyes were open.

_"Havoc here, sir. She's still unconscious. Her body mass is less than yours, so it will take a little longer for the drug to wear off. Besides me, Miles is here, and Breda, Falman and Fuery. We're all disarmed, but you're the only one who's bound at all. We're confined behind bars on one side of a large room with no windows."_

Riza is here? No, he calls her Hawkeye, not Riza. Why is she unconscious? Where is he?

Miles is saying something.

_"... this doesn't look good. There are two transmutation circles on the floor on the other side of the bars."_

Fuery is trying to jimmy the lock in the metal block. He hears Riza, no Hawkeye, groan as she comes to. She's describing the transmutation circles to him because he can't see them.

_"Human transmutation," he says, when he recognizes the description. "Hell." _

Oh, God. They're all there. _She's_ there. Someone is going to make him do it again. They'll kill someone and he's already lost his sight. What will Truth take next?

"So, who will you transmute first?" comes the oily voice of the doctor with the gold tooth. Roy knows there's something wrong about that voice being here, but he can't place it.

"First?" he asks.

"We'll start with the ones that matter to you the least," he says, sounding amused. "We'll get to _her _last."

The one who matters the least? They can't make him choose like that.

Then he notices that Fuery has stopped working on the lock. In fact, his head is in Roy's lap now. Don't check, he thinks to himself, but this is combat, he needs the information so he can decide what they should do next. But he could already smell the blood, and when he touches the neck, he remembers holding Lieutenant Hawkeye like this, bleeding like this.

"I thought that would be your first choice," says the voice that shouldn't be there for some reason.

"I didn't choose!" he screams. "I won't do this!"

But he knows it doesn't matter. His hands aren't locked in metal anymore, but they're staked to one of those transmutation circles, he can't see it, but he knows it. Shouldn't his hands hurt? That's wrong too, like the voice, that they don't hurt.

And now, he hears the other voice. _That _voice. "Roy Mustang," it says, sounding pleased with itself. "You're back. What will you give me this time?"

"Not my hearing," Roy thinks to himself, and then suddenly knows he should not even think it. Truth is a demon who will take whatever he fears most to lose.

He's lucky though. Truth doesn't take his hearing. It's his left leg, like Fullmetal that first time. Maybe they'll let him bleed to death and this can end.

But no, of course it doesn't end. The doctor has a Philosopher's Stone, and stops the bleeding.

Next is Falman, and he loses his right leg. Then Breda, and he loses his left arm. Then Havoc, and he loses his right arm. Now he's lying in her lap and he can hear her crying.

"Don't cry for me," he says. "After Miles, you're next."

Which is odd. All of the others were more dear to him than the Ishvalan officer.

Then the voice changes. No, it doesn't change, it's just that Roy realizes now that it never was the voice of the doctor with the gold tooth. How could it have been? He's dead - transmuting him was how he lost his sight in the first place. It's Scar's voice.

"I'm not going to kill a fellow Ishvalan, even if he is a dog of the Amestrian military."

Then that means she's next.

She's stopped crying. He feels something wet dripping down on his face. It's getting in his eyes, his useless eyes. He knows that smell, when did the smell of blood get so familiar?

"One last transmutation," says Scar. "We saved your hearing for last."

One last transmutation. No legs, no arms, no sight. Silence.

He screamed.

* * *

Roy sat up suddenly in bed, breathing hard. He didn't make any other noise, but the panting and the sudden movement was enough to wake Riza. Whatever the nightmare had been, the first step was always to turn on the light.

"Roy," she called gently, touching his arm.

He looked down at her and sighed with relief. She was there, he had all his limbs and all his senses. He lay back down in bed and pulled her to him, stroking her hair and then kissing her.

When he woke from some of his nightmares, he left their bed, because he felt so dirty he didn't want to contaminate her. Those were the nightmares about Ishval.

But when he dreamed about human transmutation, he felt only relief when he woke. There, at least, he was not guilty of anything. And then, he just wanted to celebrate the fact that he was alive and she was alive and they were together. And lovemaking, too, was an area where he had no reason to reproach himself. No other woman had taken her place in his arms.

It almost made the nightmare worth it.


	2. Ishval

It was only their second night together after they had gotten married. They weren't taking a real honeymoon - it was just a long weekend. They'd gotten married Thursday afternoon, and wouldn't go back to their respective offices until Monday.

Riza had fallen asleep in Roy's arms after they had made love, but over the course of the night, they had moved apart again. She wasn't used to sleeping with someone else in the bed, so she startled awake when she moved and touched him.

She immediately reached for the gun under her pillow, but it wasn't there. Then Riza realized where she was and who she was with. She leaned up on one elbow and looked down at Roy, wanting to watch her husband sleep while she calmed down. But his face was troubled. He was frowning. It must be a bad dream, Riza thought, and wondered whether she should wake him.

Then, he was sitting up, eyes open wide and breathing hard. He noticed her presence, but he was also used to sleeping alone and didn't recognize who she was right away. He grabbed her hands together behind her back and threw her face down on the bed.

"Roy, it's me," she said. "You were having a nightmare."

He let her go at once.

"That's going to be awkward, if I keep doing that," Roy said harshly, eyes clouded by whatever the dream had been.

"At least you didn't reach for a gun," she said, dryly, sitting up.

At that, he actually smiled. "You did that? Where is it?"

"I anticipated," she said. "I moved it from under my pillow to the top of the dresser before we got in bed last night. Remember I told you your bodyguard was off duty?"

"And here I thought I'd be safer ..." he said, starting to joke, but his eyes clouded again and he stopped, then suddenly got out of bed and pulled on a robe.

When it became apparent he was actually leaving the room, Riza got out of bed herself and grabbed his arm.

He threw off her arm as if she had burned him. "Don't touch me!" he said.

"What?" she said, eyes wide and mouth open.

"No, I didn't mean it like that," he said hoarsely, seeing the hurt on her face. "It's not you, it's me. I'm ... Look, I'll get over it, I always do, but I just can't stay here right now."

Riza wasn't quite sure what he meant, but she knew it had something to do with the nightmare. She pulled on her own robe and made to follow him.

"No, you stay here," he said. "Just go back to sleep." His voice was still harsh, but he was trying to make it gentler.

"Roy Mustang, if you think I'm going to sleep while you go off somewhere and mope, you've got another thing coming. It was about Ishval, wasn't it?" Riza went past him and actually opened the door and went through first.

It was such a natural move, for her to go through a door before him, that Roy automatically followed her without thinking. And then, just as automatically, they both switched positions so that he was leading and she was following.

"Where to?" she said, barely avoiding adding the "sir" to the end of the sentence.

He missed hearing it and their eyes met. He grinned half-heartedly at her, but the clouds were starting to clear from his eyes. "The kitchen," he said. "I could use a drink."

"I'll get it for you," Riza said.


	3. The Dogs at Midnight

**The Dogs at Midnight**

It's a dark tunnel, barely lit by the flashlights they brought. Ed and Al are there and Major General Armstrong and Captain Buccaneer. Ed has a map and is asking him for the dates of major battles. Vato can't remember them.

Buccaneer grins at him. "Not even the eye of God can defend against an attack he cannot see." Then Vato sees Buccaneer lying there, dead. And he knows, he doesn't see but he knows, that they're all dead. The entire population of Amestris. Because he couldn't remember.

.

Kain stands next to First Lieutenant Hawkeye. She's emptied her guns into that - creature - but still it stands there, grinning at them. He draws one gun and throws it to Hawkeye, then draws the other and takes his stance, legs slightly apart, both hands on the gun. He can do this, Havoc made sure he could. He shoots, right on target, but it makes no difference.

Then there is a blast of fire and Kain thinks it's strange that he's burning but it doesn't hurt. And as the blast of the fire pushes him through the window, his body breaking the glass, he looks back into the room and the creature is still there. "You got the wrong one, Colonel," he thinks and he's sad because now the First Lieutenant will die and the Colonel will die and never become Fuhrer.

.

There. Heymans has got all the pieces lined up. Mrs Bradley is in his pocket and Ross is a natural at this. Falman's brought Briggs in to handle the heavy fighting, Mustang and Hawkeye will handle the homunculi, and he and Fuery just have to spin this so they can hand Bradley's position to Mustang when the fighting's over.

Then the radio turns to static. Fuery is slumped over the table next to the radio. The others are dropping too. Why? There's no blood. He knows he'll drop soon unless he can find his mistake. What piece is unaccounted for?

Then he sees the Fuhrer enter the room with Mustang. Mustang without his gloves.

Heymans shoots, empties his gun into the Fuhrer, but it does no good. Then the Fuhrer swings his sword and Mustang's head topples from his body. "You thought you could outplay me?" Bradley sneers, just before Heymans falls.

.

Jean is running. Running after Mustang and Hawkeye and Al. At first, he seems to be making progress, closing the gap, but then there's a woman's voice. "I hate being dumped," she says. What a joke. Jean doesn't dump women, they dump him. Then there's a stabbing pain through his middle and he falls ...

... into a wheelchair. It cost him some time and now there's more distance between them, but the wheelchair is fast and Breda gave him those weights so he's really strong. He's catching up, almost there, and then everything ...

... stops.

* * *

Vato tosses and turns, talking in his sleep. His wife hears the dates he's mumbling and recognizes the dream. She wakes him up and starts reciting the battles and dates out loud. Vato feels foolish when he wakes up like this and she does that, but it actually helps. He recites them with her. Then they share back rubs and talk softly for a few moments before they both settle back to sleep again.

.

Kain wakes up feeling sad and teary-eyed. He says a prayer, thanking God that he hasn't had to kill since Aerugo and asking for the safety of all his loved ones, among whom he counts all of Mustang's dogs: Vato, Jean, Heymans, Hawkeye and of course, Mustang himself. He adds an extra prayer for Mustang because Kain thinks he needs it.

.

Rebecca has no patience for this kind of thing, not in the middle of the night anyway. Heymans is so wound up he gets out of bed and goes downstairs to the living room where his chess set is. He sets it up and begins playing. The nightmare wasn't real but it reminds him that next time he might overlook a piece, miss a play.

When the game's over, he goes back to bed. Rebecca, still not awake, snuggles up to him. In the morning, she'll see that he played chess in the night and fix something nice for breakfast. He feels her pressed against his back and thinks of blueberry pancakes as he falls back asleep.

.

Rose is a light sleeper. She hears the change in Jean's breathing and his mumbling and it wakes her. She caresses his forehead and smoothes his hair, murmuring reassurances. Sometimes, he still wakes up when she does this, but usually he doesn't. His features relax and the mumbling stops. This is another time when he doesn't wake up.

* * *

**Author's Note:**

Won third place for the prompt "Midnight" at the fma_fic_contest livejournal community.


End file.
